Abandoned
by Hikaru Morinaga
Summary: [Rekka] Instead of getting weapons like Hector and everyone else asked Matthew to get, he instead finds something else, and it's not what you think it is. Slight MatthewxGuy slash.


**Abandoned**

**Warnings: Slight slash. That's it. **

Matthew was walking around town trying to find the armoury. Of all the people, he thought, I had to get the short end of the stick. Hearing a bunch of children laughing and what sounded to be some sort of animal whimpering, he stopped and saw in an alleyway a bunch of kids, all of whom looked very poor, hitting something with a stick. When he stepped closer, he saw what they were hitting: a puppy. He couldn't leave it there and let it be abused, so clearing his throat, he crossed his arms and saw the kids stop and look at him.

"'Ey missur," one said, "Leave us 'lone. We ain't doin' nothin'."

Matthew glared at the one that spoke and shook his head.

"Apparently you are," he said, "Else you wouldn't be holding that stick in your hand, and it wouldn't happen to have blood from that poor dog on it." The one that spoke to Matthew earlier crossed his arms and spat on the ground.

"What's it ta you what we do ta dis pup, eh?"

Before the band of children knew what had happened, they realised that the puppy wasn't on the ground in the corner of the alley, and was instead in the thief's arms. The rest of the kids' jaws dropped, but the leader simply scoffed.

"Yer quite the sneaky one. What are you, anyway?"

Matthew stroked the whimpering puppy and simply said, "A spy." The leader got scared, and Matthew just laughed.

"Nah, I'm nothing but a thief," Matthew said, and the leader of the children sighed in relief.

One of the kids, a girl, remarked, "You speak quite good fer a thief. Yer sure ya ain't pullin' a legs?"

Matthew, imitating the children, said, "Dat's because I 'idn't grow up in der slums. D'ya realise how stupid ya sound talkin' like dis?"

With that, Matthew ran away, completely forgetting about his reason for being in the small village anyway.

"You brought us a puppy? Where's the axes? The swords? The bows, the lances, the javelins? Where'd they go? Matthew..."

Matthew dodged a swat in his direction from Hector.

"I couldn't just leave it there, Hector. You would've done the same thing, I'm sure."

Hector sighed.

"You could have at least brought back some weapons, you know." Matthew chuckled.

"Saving something's life, even if it ain't human, should make you feel good, you know."

"What did I tell you about that street talk, Matthew?" Hector asked, cleaning the blade of his axe with a cloth.

"You'd think working in House Ostia would've knocked all that nonsense out of your head." Matthew just shrugged and said, "'Tis my upbringing, Hector. Can't help what I was brought up to be, right?" Hector said nothing.

"MATTHEW!" Matthew looked up to see a really pissed off Guy holding the puppy by the makeshift collar.

"Keep this nuisance out of my tent, will ya?" He dropped it into the thief's lap.

"Aww, Guy," Matthew said, petting the dog that was scared stiff. "You meanie! You scared him!"

Guy crossed his arms, not caring.

"I. don't. care. I don't appreciate it when things start _chewing_ on my hair." It was at that moment that Matthew realised the puppy (named "Rover" due to the puppy's search and seize attitude) had what looked like a hair tie in his mouth and snickered. Guy was not amused.

"You're sleeping _outside_ the tent, Matthew," Guy said, brushing his waist length hair with his fingers. Matthew sighed.

"Tie your hair _up_ and there would be no problems. Nothing to bite and think it's a chew toy. Problem solved." Matthew got up, Rover in hand, and kissed the myrmidon on the cheek.

"Still want me to sleep outside the tent?" A smirk played on the thief's face. Guy blushed.

"Keep the dog outside tied to a tree or something, and I'll let you back in." Matthew smiled.

"You owe me," Matthew said, and took out the oathpaper and wrote something down.

"It's always favours for you, isn't it?" Matthew said nothing. Finally, Matthew simply said, "You're almost paid up, Guy. I'll miss all the 'favours' you do, though." Guy blushed.

Matthew loved Guy's braid. While Guy was asleep on the thief's lap, he would often twirl it around his hand, stroke it, and play with it in a variation of other ways. He took the braid and saw that it was half unwound; their actions but a few hours ago must have caused the dishevelment of Guy's sexiest feature. Pulling out the hair tie, he brushed his fingers through Guy's hair to unbraid it completely, marveling at how long it was.

Perhaps later, Matthew thought, Guy and I can have a nice bath in the river on the bottom of that hill. Elimine knows he needs it; his hair is all greasy and crap.

But did Matthew care? Guy's hair was still sexy to him, even though it was a hazard during battle. Someone could pull on it and break the boy's neck. Another scenario would be for it to get caught in someone's armour. Worse would be if someone cut it off. Both Guy and Matthew would be devastated. A barking sound pulled Matthew from his thoughts. Being careful to not drop Guy's head onto the ground and he got up, he opened the flap of the tent. Rover was barking at intruders. _Bandits_.

"'Suppose I have to wake Guy up," Matthew said, closing the flap and lighting an oil lamp.

"Guuuuy...Guy..._GEE_¹."

The myrmidon shot up, looking around and realising that it was only Matthew.

"'S th' matter?" he asked, rubbing his eyes and yawning.

"Bandits," Matthew whispered. "We don't want to wake up anyone else, 'kay? We can handle this ourselves."

"Don' ya think that's stupi'?" Guy asked, getting the Killing Edge ready.

"Nah, Guy. It's not. We can handle 'em. There's only--" Matthew paused to look out the tent flap and see how many bandits there were. "--Three or four. Kinda hard to tell. C'mon," Matthew said, motioning to the outside with a wave of his hand. "Let's go." Guy followed him.

**Author's Notes: **This is all Sara's fault. It really is. But I love her for it.

¹ I, unlike everyone else, pronounce "Guy" as "Gee" ("G" like the "g" in "geese"). Like the French pronounce it. Yeah.


End file.
